Deadline: 21-Oct-21
Applications are now open for the 2021 Young Water Fellowship (YWF) to empower early-stage young entrepreneurs to validate and launch social businesses that tackle water, sanitation & hygiene issues at the community level.
The selected young entrepreneurs are provided with a holistic package of financial and technical support, including: training, coaching and mentorship, opportunities for seed funding and networking. By launching their social businesses, these young entrepreneurs contribute to universal access to safe water and sanitation.
For the YWF Uganda 2021, Young Water Solutions is partnering with the Ugandan organisation WASEU. At least 7 young entrepreneurs (‘’Young Water Fellows’’) will have the opportunity to participate in two weeks of intensive training on business and WASH in Kampala delivered by WASEU and international water experts, exponentially increase their supporting networks in the water and entrepreneurship sectors and apply for funding for the first steps of implementation of their social enterprises.
Characteristics of your Initiative
The proposed initiative should directly address at least one of the following issues:
- Access to safe drinking water
- Access adequate sanitation facilities
- Access to safe hygiene (including Covid-19 prevention)
- Wastewater treatment and faecal sludge management (FSM)
- Menstrual hygiene
- Water scarcity
- Water pollution
- Water efficiency
- Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM)
- Protection and restoration of ecosystems
- Solid Waste management impacting water quality
- Other WASH management issues
Benefits
Throughout the incubation phase of the programme (October 2021-September 2022), the selected Young Water Fellows will benefit from:
- Two one-week boot camps providing start-up training in the WASH sector.
- Coaching and mentoring support
- Support in developing networks in the
- entrepreneurship and WASH sectors
- The opportunity to apply for a seed funding of up to 5,000 to develop a pilot project of their social enterprises during 6 months and validate their impact
YWF Programme Steps
- Bootcamp 1 – 29th November to 4 th December 2021: The training sessions will take place close to Kampala with all travel, food and accommodation (shared and divided by gender) covered by the programme. The training will be delivered by WASEU, Young Water Solutions and water experts. Training is designed for entrepreneurs with little to medium business knowledge. It is not a training for advanced business people so, if you have a business degree or a lot of business experience, you might not find it useful!
- MVP Phase: Participating start-ups will take two months to test hypotheses about the technicalities of their product by prototyping their solution and/or to validate the demand for their service. With some funding provided, it is hoped that the start-ups are able to establish a minimum viable product (MVP) by the second bootcamp.
- Bootcamp 2 – February 2022: During the second week of training, Fellows will be working to fine-tune their business plan and financial planning based on the lessons learned from the MVP phase with the help of intensive coaching from the facilitators.
- Pilot project: After the training, Fellows will have the opportunity to apply for a pollination grant to pilot their solution and business model. Over six months, the Fellows will get their start-up underway with a defined product/service, gaining experience in the field and allowing them to show impact and develop a promotion and sales strategy to grow in the coming months
Eligibility Criteria
You should apply if:
- You are 18 to 35 years old at the time of the application.
- You are the founder or co-founder of an initiative that contributes to the solution of a well defined water, sanitation, or hygiene problem in your country. The initiative should be in its planning or initial stages and have the ability to be turned into a social business (i.e. have a long-term sustainability component or business model).
- You are a resident of Uganda, and you intend to stay in Uganda for at least 1.5 years after the training and spend at least 15 hours per week to work on your social business.
- You can attend two bootcamps of one week in December 2021 and February 2022 (exact dates to be confirmed).
- You have at least an intermediate knowledge of English, meaning that you are able to understand and express opinions in this language. The bootcamps will be held in English so, if you work as part of a team, it may be worthwhile to put forward an English-speaking team member to be the Fellow.
- Women are especially encouraged to apply.
- It is not a requirement that your business is already registered or has started operations.
For more information, visit https://ywfuganda.org/